I came across this article on the web about the benefits of reading.
http://encarta.msn.com/encnet/departments/elementary/?article=WhatEffectReadingHasonOurMinds>1=8236 [no longer available]
The article mentions a test of 268 U.S. College students that found 70% of them believe that Jewish people outnumber Muslims in the world. (There are 800 million Muslims and only 20 million Jewish people.)
I think we can conclude that the Muslim lobby in the U.S. is not as effective as they would like it to be.
That test reminded me of a question I like to ask young people: “How many people died in WWII, including all soldiers and civilians of all countries.”
One college student told me she thought the number might be as high as 1,000. (Yes, I meant to type ONE THOUSAND.) Some guess 50,000. A few have guessed that it might be a million people, possibly two or three million.
Almost no one guesses 50 million, which is about right, give or take several million.
I realize it’s not practical to require a general knowledge test before allowing people to vote. But wouldn’t it be interesting to require the test just for informational purposes? The election winner would still be the person with the most votes, but the results might look this way when read on the news.
“Bob Smith has been elected President by 64% of the general public. That includes 99% of the people who believe China is ‘some sort of dishware’.”